ARMONK, N.Y. – More than two weeks after Hurricane Sandy hit North Castle, the town is just beginning to get back to normal as almost all residents have finally had electricity restored to their homes.

After this was the second year in a row that a major storm hit the area, North Castle Town Supervisor Howard Arden is pledging to work toward putting a plan in place that would prevent such a long clean-up period.

"I've been analyzing the situation and it can't continue this way," Arden said of the storm cleanup at last week's Town Board meeting. "It's just not acceptable."

Arden said that last year members of the Town Board had a similar issues following Hurricane Irene and met with members of Con Edison to create a resolution. Arden said a plan was not put in place following Irene and that something must be done after 98 percent of town residents were left without power following Sandy for a significant period of time.

"Last year when we met with Con Ed, everybody verbally lambasted them and they took their beating and nothing really happened," Arden said. "It's bigger than just North Castle obviously, but we can work with other towns and officials."

The main reason why so many residents in North Castle lost power was because of fallen trees and downed wires. Arden said there are only two solutions to that problem: cutting down the trees or bury the power lines in the ground, which is a much more likely solution.

Town Board member John Cronin said working toward burying more power lines throughout North Castle should be a goal of the board's in 2013.

"The power problem is going to require a long term fix that is not inexpensive," Cronin said. "But there are fixes we could do to give a significant portion of the town power during events like this that happen far too frequently."

Comments (2)

I never realized just what was involved in putting wires under ground but after speaking with the Con Ed liason during the storm, he explained the cost that would be involved if this was done. I believe he said in the millions of dollars. It might be wise to require that all new homes built after this date be required to do so however, for the wires of North Castle to be put underground as one solution seems prohibitive. Therefore, Town Board, let's take the time to investigate all options before you guys start comining up with solutions that might not be in the best interest of our pocketbooks.

I've seen homeowners REFUSE to have tree crews trim near their houses...They state "They look ugly"! Well I'd rather look at an ugly tree than be without power for a week or so..........................People need to be realistic in what to expect from their electric provider, and need to comply with the efforts to keep things maintaned. Stop complaining about stupid stuff and let the tree crews do their jobs...............Hats off to the men and women who worked endless hours-leaving their own homes unattended-to restore our power xoxo